Twenty-four Canadians were killed in the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs. Three other people with close Canadian connections were also killed. Some of them had Canadian relatives or were born in Canada, but later took American citizenship.

Michael Arczynski — The 45-year-old sports enthusiast from Vancouver was a senior vice-president of Aon Corp.’s Manhattan office. He and his wife, Lori, who was raised in Montreal, had three children after their marriage in 1990 and Lori was pregnant at the time of the attack. Arczynski, who loved to ski near Vancouver and spent a lot of time with family in Vermont, also left behind three daughters from his first marriage.

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Garnet (Ace) Bailey — The 53-year-old director of pro scouting for the National Hockey League’s Los Angeles Kings was a native of Lloydminster, Sask. He was aboard United Airlines Flight 175 when it crashed into the World Trade Center’s south tower. He was a veteran of 11 NHL seasons as a player with the Boston Bruins, the Detroit Red Wings, the St. Louis Blues and the Washington Capitals. He moved to the World Hockey Association for the 1978-79 season and joined the Edmonton Oilers where he was a linemate of teenage phenomenon Wayne Gretzky. Bailey ended his playing career in 1980 after he accumulated seven Stanley Cup rings and turned to coaching. He is survived by his wife, Katherine, and son, Todd. Katherine, who lives in Lynnfield, Mass., has started the Ace Bailey Children’s Fund, which supports play centres and programs at the Tufts New England Medical Center in Boston.———

David Barkway — The 34-year-old executive with BMO Nesbitt Burns in Toronto was in the office of Cantor Fitzgerald on the 105th floor of the north tower. He sent an electronic message to his Toronto colleagues, saying, “We need help … This is not a joke.” Barkway was in New York with his wife, Cindy, for a three-day business trip just days after celebrating his birthday. After his death, the avid golfer nicknamed Barky was remembered by friends in Toronto as a bright and thoughtful leader who loved fine cigars, high-tech stereos and trips to the cottage. The couple has two young sons, one who was born in January 2002 and named David after his father. The $1,500 David Barkway Memorial Scholarship in Economics was set up by the Department of Economics at Carleton University to honour his memory and life and is awarded to a high-achieving third or fourth year economics student in need of financial assistance.

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Ken Basnicki — The 48-year-old father of two was in the north tower attending a conference for BEA Systems, the software firm he worked for in Toronto. He was last heard from at 8:55 a.m. in a cellphone call to his mother from an office on the 106th floor. His wife, Maureen, a former flight attendant grounded in Germany at the time, said he had a boundless passion for golf, skiing, snowboarding and his Harley Davidson motorcycle. In the five years since her husband’s death, Maureen has started the Canadian Coalition Against Terror and is lobbying for legislation that would allow Canadians to sue countries or groups that support terrorism. Maureen and her daughter planned to attend the memorial service in New York, where she will read some of the victims’ names with another Canadian who lost her husband.

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Joseph Collison — Collison was born in Toronto in 1951 and moved to New York City more than 15 years ago. He was on he 102nd floor of the north tower, where he worked in the mail room of Kidder, Peabody & Co., according to his sister-in-law, Janet Collison. He was buried in Mississauga next to his parents. At the time of his death, Collison, who was not married, was hoping to adopt a young boy in New York whom he cared for.

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Cynthia Connolly — Connolly, 40, transferred from insurance firm Aon Corp.’s Montreal offices to New York in 1999. She and her husband, Donald Poissant, married in 1998 and lived in Metuchen, N.J., with their Airedale-German shepherd, Shadow, and pet cat, Obi. People in her neighbourhood fondly remembered Connolly, four-foot-three, struggling to control her dog as they walked through the area. Her mother recalled her as “loving and caring,” always showing a soft spot for stray animals who she would bring home when she was a child.

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Arron Dack — The 39-year-old father of two was known to his family and friends for his ability to succeed in anything he tried. Dack was born in England, but moved to Canada with his parents in 1970. The senior executive with Encompys was attending a conference in the north tower of the World Trade Center when the first plane hit. He called his wife Abigail Carter and calmly asked her to call 911 since he thought a small bomb had gone off. Carter, who lived in New Jersey at the time but has since moved to Seattle, started two support groups for widows. The couple has two young children, Olivia and Carter.

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Christine Egan — The 55-year-old Health Canada nurse epidemiologist from Winnipeg was visiting her younger brother’s office on the 105th floor in the second tower of the World Trade Center. Friends and family said the woman with a beaming smile was one of the most energetic, fun-loving people they knew. Egan was raised in England and moved to London, Ont. She taught at the University of Manitoba and received a PhD in community health services. Egan also had a love of Canada’s North, where she had practised as a nurse.

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Michael Egan — The 51-year-old lived in New Jersey and worked on the 105th floor of the World Trade Center at the insurance firm Aon Corp. The father of two boys moved to the New York area from Montreal in 1991 after immigrating to Canada 33 years ago to follow his sister Christine. She happened to be visiting him on Sept. 11 and was also killed in the attack. Michael spent much of his time introducing his son Matthew, who has Down syndrome, to various sports. His passion, his wife Anna has said, “was to make Matthew as happy as he could be.”

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Albert Elmarry — The 30-year-old moved from Toronto to the United States in 1999 to work in computer support for Cantor Fitzgerald on the 103rd floor of one of the towers. He had worked for IBM Canada when in Toronto. Elmarry, a devoutly religious man who started each day with a prayer, met his wife, Irenie, on a visit to his native Egypt.

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Meredith Ewart and Peter Feidelberg — The Montreal couple moved to the United States in 1997 and married in March 2000. Ewart, 29, and Feidelberg, 34, lived in Hoboken, N.J., and both had offices on the 104th floor of the World Trade Center’s south tower, where they worked at Aon Corp. At the time of the attacks, Meredith’s father, Robert Ewart, frantically called hospitals and the police in New York and at one point thought Feidelberg had survived based on a false Internet report. Friends remembered Feidelberg for his adventurous and competitive spirit, and his athletic interests, which included basketball, mountain biking, scuba diving and running the 1998 New York City Marathon. A memorial fund in their names had been set up with the Canadian Council of Christians and Jews.

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Alexander Filipov — Filipov, 70, was born in Regina and lived in Concord, Mass. He was on American Airlines Flight 11 when it hit the World Trade Center, but had been booked on another Delta flight to Los Angeles. He switched his flight at the last minute, thinking it would allow him to get home sooner for his 44th wedding anniversary on Sept. 15. An electrical engineer with three sons, Filipov became a U.S. citizen in 1962. His widow, Loretta, said he never slowed down, trying bungee jumping at age 60 and carrying on with his favourite pastimes — golf, skiing and music.

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Ralph Gerhardt — The 34-year-old vice-president with Cantor Fitzgerald called his parents in Toronto, just after the first plane hit the north tower. “Something just happened at the WTC. We either got hit by a bomb or plane. I am OK. We are OK. I love you, but I have to go now. We are evacuating. Call you later,” Gerhardt said in a message to his father, Hans. But no more calls came after his son said he was going to look for his girlfriend, who was also killed. Family members visited Ground Zero shortly after the disaster.

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Stuart Lee — Lee had returned a day before the attacks from his Korean homeland where he had taken his wife, Lynn Udbjorg, to show off his roots. Lee, 30, was vice-president of integrated services for DataSynapse, a technology company that serves the financial industry. He spent the last hour of his life e-mailing his company, trying to figure out how to get out of the building where he was attending a conference on the 106th floor. Lee, who grew up in Vancouver, loved travelling the globe with his wife, who described him as a romantic and someone known for his generosity to his friends and family.

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Mark Ludvigsen — The 32-year-old native of Rothesay, N.B., moved to the United States with his family at age seven. The avid rugby player graduated from Virginia’s College of William & Mary and worked as a bond broker at Keefe, Bruyette and Woods. He and his wife of three years, Maureen, lived in Manhattan. His parents, Karl and Christina, live in Pottersville, N.J. Ludvigsen was working on the 89th floor of the south tower, but managed to leave a message for his mother at 9 a.m. “Mother, now don’t you worry. I’m in the other tower. I’m fine and I’ll call you later,” he said.

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Bernard Mascarenhas — The 54-year-old native of Newmarket, Ont., worked for Marsh Canada, whose parent company, Marsh and McLennan Cos. Inc., had offices at the World Trade Center. The chief information officer for the company was on the 97th floor of the north tower as part of a five-day business trip to New York. Marsh had about 1,900 employees in the two towers; 295 were killed. Mascarenhas left behind his wife, Raynette, a son, Sven, and a daughter, Jaclyn.

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Colin McArthur — The 52-year-old Glasgow native moved to Toronto in 1977 to work as an insurance broker. He moved to Montreal in 1986 after marrying his wife, Brenda. McArthur became a Canadian citizen and worked as a deputy managing director at Aon Corp. A memorial service was held for McArthur, a keen golfer, at a New Jersey golf course. McArthur loved the game, despite his dubious achievements on the golf course, according to Brenda. She set up the Colin McArthur Postgraduate Scholarship at his alma mater, the University of Glasgow, for students who lost a parent or guardian in the Sept. 11 attacks. Brenda, 49, remarried a year ago and planned to mark the fifth anniversary privately at home.

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Michael Pelletier — The 36-year-old commodities broker for TradeSpark, a division of trading firm Cantor Fitzgerald, on the 105th floor of 1 World Trade Center. He called his wife, Sophie, and told her he was trapped in the building and that he loved her. Pelletier’s father refused to believe at first that his son, a strikingly handsome natural athlete who excelled at hockey, wouldn’t get out. “We were saying there’s gotta be a way, we know Mike, he’s a survivor, he’ll find some way out.” At the time of his death, he had a three-year-old daughter and one-year-old son.

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Donald Robson — A Toronto native, Robson, 52, had lived in the United States for 20 years. He was a partner and bond broker for Cantor Fitzgerald on the 103rd floor of the north tower of the World Trade Center. He and his wife, Kathy, had two sons, Geoff and Scott. He had been planning 24th wedding anniversary celebrations with his wife. “Then bang, it’s all over just like that,” she said from her Long Island home a year after the attacks. The friends Robson left behind described him as a “fun-loving guy who lit up every room that he entered.”

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Ruffino (Roy) Santos — Santos, 37, a native of Manila, moved to British Columbia with his family in the 1980s. He moved to New York in the late 1990s, where he worked for Guy Carpenter as a computer consultant. He was supposed to leave the 94th floor of the World Trade Center the week after he died to work for Accenture. His mother, Aurora, and her two sons went to New York for the first anniversary. “I want to see Ground Zero to pray and bring some flowers and candles.”

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Vladimir Tomasevic — A native of Yugoslavia, Tomasevic, 36, moved to Canada in 1994. He lived in Toronto with his wife, Tanja, and was vice-president of software development for Optus E-Business Solutions. He was on his first visit to New York and was attending a financial conference on 106th floor of World Trade Center’s north tower. “He was always there for anyone — that’s what we miss about him the most,” Tanja has said. Her friend Maureen Basnicki, who also lost her husband in the attacks, said Tanja planned to attend the service in New York. Tanja, who received a small amount of remains and a piece of shredded material from his pants, has urged the Canadian government to provide more support for the families of 9-11 victims and erect a monument to them.

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Chantal (Chanti) Vincelli — The 38-year-old former Montrealer worked as a marketing assistant at DataSynapse Inc. Vincelli moved to New York in the late 1990s and lived in Harlem with her cats. She was setting up a kiosk for a trade show on the 106th floor of the north tower. She dreamed of becoming a talk-show host. Her brother Anthony said the woman who dreamed of becoming a talk-show host “had charisma, she had wit.” The local grocer named her the Harlem Princess and the name stuck.

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Debbie Williams — Williams, 35, worked for Aon Corp., for 15 years. She and her husband, Darren, moved to Hoboken, N.J., after being transferred to New York City by their employer. Williams, a Montreal native, gave birth to their only child six months after settling in Hoboken.

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There were three other victims with deep Canadian roots:

Frank Joseph Doyle — The 39-year-old Detroit native was married to Kimmy Chedel of St. Adele, Que. Doyle, an executive vice-president of Keefe, Bruyette and Woods, left two children, Zoe and Garrett, now 7 and 6. Chedel says the family will be at their summer home in St. Adele on the anniversary. Doyle, a gifted athlete who did a triathlon the summer before he died, was on the 89th floor of the second tower. He called to say he couldn’t get out. “He said,‘Hi sweetie, it’s me. I know you know this, but I love you,’“ says Chedel, who met her husband at New York University and moved with him to New Jersey in 2000. Chedel says she has no desire to visit Ground Zero until a memorial is built. Doyle’s friends from Bowdoin College established a memorial scholarship in his name for outstanding athletes. Chedel also created a team in her husband’s honour, which participates in road races and a triathlon. Chedel says her children are adjusting well to life without their dad, possibly because they were so young when it happened. “Not a day has gone by that I have not thought of Frank,” she said. “I cherish the memories of the 12 years we had together.”

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Jane Beatty — A native of Britain, Beatty, 53, lived in Ontario for 20 years before moving to the United States to work as a technical supervisor at Marsh and McLennan Cos. Inc. in the World Trade Center’s north tower. She worked on the 96th floor of the north tower and phoned her husband Bob just before the plane hit the tower. Three weeks before she died, she celebrated her fifth anniversary of surviving breast cancer. She had two grown sons.

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LeRoy Homer — Homer, 36, was the co-pilot of United Airlines Flight 93 that crashed in Pennsylvania after being taken over by hijackers. Homer was an American citizen, but his wife Melodie Thorpe was Canadian, having grown up in Hamilton. Family say Homer always wanted to be a pilot. He was just 15 when he started flight instruction in a Cessna 152. The couple, who lived in Marlton, N.J., have a young daughter. Homer joined the forces, serving in Desert Shield and Desert Storm, and later supporting operations in Somalia. He received many commendations during his military career. He joined United Airlines in May 1995 and received awards posthumously for his actions on board Flight 93. The LeRoy W. Homer Jr. Foundation was established to provide financial support and encouragement to young people who want to pursue professional flight instruction leading to certification as a private pilot.